Dr. Jeffrey Turnbull is the President of the Canadian Medical Association, a man I greatly admire, and my kind of doctor.
He is a firm believer in public health care, an egalitarian who contends that every Canadian has the right to quality care, whether it’s one of the five million without a family doctor, one of the 30 waiting for a bed this day in The Ottawa Hospital, or one of the homeless living under the Laurier Bridge.
He wants doctors to get involved in the fight for poverty reduction and affordable housing. “I think we have to broaden our perspective a little bit,” he says, “and look at the social determinants of health.”
The greedy doctors hate him, the idealistic ones worship him.
So I wish all Canadians could have heard what he said today, about the future of our health system.
We can no longer tolerate leaving a system so large, so vital to the well-being of our citizens and to the success of our country, to manage itself without core information systems, indicators and measures of success; without modern governance, transparent accountability and visionary leadership; and, above all, without a clear and unwavering focus on the people the system is designed to serve - the patients.
The stirring call for the federal government to take a leading role in making medicare better for all Canadians.
Canada's doctors think the best way to do this is to start with the fundamentals: that is the principles underlying medicare: universality, accessibility, comprehensiveness, portability, and public administration. What we cherish about our system are the ideals embodied in these principles - the idea that the health care you get is the same whether you are rich or poor, or live in Whitehorse or Whitby.
The bold vision, the common sense, and above all the wonderful humanity.
I am also convinced that, if we are to live up to our country's values, we also need to look at the health of our citizens in a wider context. As CMA president, I've had the opportunity to meet with physicians in every part of the country, in communities large and small. One after another, they tell me of patients who struggle with poverty, hunger and lack of adequate housing, and who pay the price with their health.
The poor have greater rates of addiction, disability, mental illness, cancer and heart disease, and chronic illness such as diabetes. The poor get sicker than the rest of us, and they die sooner.
A voice for those who cannot speak for themselves. Those who are seen but not heard...
The glory of this speech is its noble and very Canadian idealism. One that I share completely, totally, absolutely. As does my companion Sébastien, who although he is not really political, practically dictated this post.
The tragedy is that Turnbull's words too will fall on deaf ears. Because Stephen Harper has no interest in reforming our public health system. He wants to privatize it. Or strangle it in its bed.
Which is why I agree with the good doctor.
When Canadians go to the polls, it will likely be their last opportunity to signal, through the ballot box, the focus they expect from federal politicians prior to the expiry of the Health Accord. As Canadians, we will need to choose wisely, as our vote will have an impact that will last far beyond the mandate of the next Parliament.
Why I believe that medicare should be a central issue in the next election campaign. Why I think we should ask Canadians how can they trust Stephen Harper to protect our health system, when he spent so many years trying to DESTROY it?
And of course, why I made this humble video...
I'm making a better one eh? The ending was too abrupt, and I should have added a poor senior sobbing in one of Stephen Harper's welfare hospitals. Because they are the ones who will suffer the most.
But the message will be the same. My heroes are healers, not killers.
And then it all became clear. It was all about Big Brother.
The past was what he said it was. Stephen Harper loves Canada.
Canada isNOT a Northern European welfare state in the worst sense of the term, and very proud of it.
He wants to save medicare NOT destroy it.
And as this latest ad from the Con Ministry of Propaganda and Disinformation proves.
He does NOT want an election...
And this too is true:
"And if all others accepted the lie which the Party imposed-if all records told the same tale-then the lie passed into history and became truth. 'Who controls the past' ran the Party slogan, 'controls the future: who controls the present controls the past.'" - George Orwell, 1984, Book 1, Chapter 3
There will be no loyalty, except loyalty towards the Party. There will be no love, except the love of Big Brother. There will be no laughter, except the laugh of triumph over a defeated enemy...Always, at every moment, there will be the thrill of victory, the sensation of trampling on an enemy who is helpless. If you want a picture of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face—forever."
And for those who wish to avoid that fate, and save the country they love, this is the greatest truth of all:
"Until they become conscious they will never rebel, and until after they they have rebelled they cannot become conscious." - George Orwell, 1984, Book 1, Chapter 7
So when will we become conscious? When will we REBEL?
This country is about to be gutted. Like the census.
"Sanity is not statistical."
- George Orwell, 1984, Book 1, Chapter 9
Gawd. I see Stephen Harper was talking tough on Libya today. Sounding like MosesNoahSteve.
“A government’s first and most fundamental responsibility is to protect the safety and security of its citizens,” Harper said. “Mr. Gadhafi has blatantly violated this most basic trust.”
After failing miserably to protect the safety and security of Canadians.
The Canadian effort has been plagued with confusion and delays...A lack of co-ordination on the ground at the airport in Tripoli may have resulted in a charter plane leaving Libya empty — with no stranded Canadians on board.
Blatantly violating their basic trust in government by lying about EVERYTHING.
Libya is still crawling with his friends from Big Oil. And nobody cares what Great Statesman Bumbling Idiot Leader says about ANYTHING.
Nations are judged by what they do, not what they say. Canada’s foreign policy, as well as the shattered Conservative commitment to accountability at home, diminishes solemn pronouncements to meaningless bromides.
But no doubt he will seek to portray this Con klown debacle into the next best thing since Noah's Ark. In order to distract attention from this sordid scandal.
In fact I wouldn't be surprised if he follows up by appointing Bev Oda as our new ambassador to Libya. To get her out of the country before she talks too much.
Expose her to tank fire.
And force her to exchange this limo...
For a CAMEL. For failing to shred the doctored documents.
Another poll released this week showed that Canadians are right up there with the Swedes and Saudis as the world’s leading back-patters on how well their countries have done. That national self-congratulation is exactly what the Conservatives hope will put Canadians in a grateful mood come voting day.
Because they're easily impressed eh? Or just MORONS.
Especially those who believe that the porker Cons just handed out about a half billion dollars of our tax dollars in ONE week...to buy votes. And are running millions of dollars of TV ads because they DON'T want an election.
Oh boy. What more can you say ?
Except that this country is in real trouble.
Canadians are being fooled, screwed, and humiliated.
But the animals are REALLY grateful...
OMG. Did you hear that prairie dog ? He started off shouting "Alan, Alan !!!! "
Scott Sumer, a public teacher from Rockford, Illinois: "I brought my son here because this is what democracy looks like and feels like. He needs to see this. He needs to know this."
Jeff Skiles, US Airways co-pilot who helped safely ditch a packed passenger jet on the Hudson River in New York City in 2009: "On that day, there were many many heroes: pilots, flight attendants, traffic controllers, firemen, policemen, folks in the ferry boats, EMTs. We didn't abandon those passengers to save themselves. We all worked together to save everybody. That's a lesson that people in this capitol building need to learn ... Every one of them was union."
In recent weeks, Madison has been the scene of large demonstrations against the governor’s budget bill, which would deny collective-bargaining rights to public-sector workers. Gov. Scott Walker claims that he needs to pass his bill to deal with the state’s fiscal problems. But his attack on unions has nothing to do with the budget.
What’s happening in Wisconsin is, instead, a power grab — an attempt to exploit the fiscal crisis to destroy the last major counterweight to the political power of corporations and the wealthy.
That is what will happen to us if Harper and his teabagger Cons ever win a majority. And so is this.
Republicans in the House of Representatives are mounting an assault on women’s health and freedom that would deny millions of women access to affordable contraception and life-saving cancer screenings and cut nutritional support for millions of newborn babies in struggling families. And this is just the beginning.
These are treacherous times for women’s reproductive rights and access to essential health care. House Republicans mistakenly believe they have a mandate to drastically scale back both even as abortion warfare is accelerating in the states. To stop them, President Obama’s firm leadership will be crucial. So will the rising voices of alarmed Americans.
So when I wonder will Canadians finally be alarmed?
When will we take OUR struggle into the streets?
Isn't it time to ask Canadians. If the Cons are the Republicans.
Even in the bleakness of late winter in Canada, this new poll doesn't really depress me.
The Cons have been bombarding the airwaves with all kinds of attack ads. And the day we fight back we will do better.
What does depress me is that a Canadian journalist like John Ibbitson could ask such a stupid question.
Who’s afraid of a big, bad Harper majority?
The enemies of Stephen Harper fear that he would be willing to get far, far ahead of the curve. They believe he harbours a radical social and fiscal agenda that he would unleash if given an opportunity: The right to abortion and gay marriage would be reversed; the Canada Pension Plan privatized; health care turned over to the corporations; the CBC stripped of its funding; safety and environmental regulations trashed – well, the sky would fall.
And then quote a Liberal to come up with this stupid answer:
Mr. Harper's paramount desire to make the Conservatives Canada's new natural governing party will always serve as the best check on whatever rabid-right tendencies he might harbour.
As if we were crazy for fearing a majority, and Harper wasn't a sinister ideologue and a ruthless political thug, who after five years of changing Canada beyond beyond recognition wouldn't give a damn what happened to his party.
Because it's all about HIM.
He's the one who is CRAZY.
And a man with a record like his, who lies about EVERYTHING, can't be trusted with absolute power because he's capable of ANYTHING.
And has Ibbitson considered what might happen if he is wrong? And Harper does everything Ibbitson says he won't. With the support of only FORTY per cent of Canadians.
This country could be torn apart by the greatest social upheaval it has ever seen...
As the majority tries to prevent a minority from destroying the Canada they love.
Denying Harper a majority isn't just the only SANE thing to do. It's more than just guarding women's rights, protecting gay people and the poor, or saving the CBC, the NFB, the Canada Pension Plan and medicare.
It really is about saving Canada.
So let the foul Cons, and all those dumb Canadians sleepwalking to disaster, understand this:
We WILL fight back.
We will NOT allow gay rights to be extinguished, we will NOT allow women to be forced back to the 1950s barefoot and pregnant.
If it wasn't such a sad and sordid spectacle, and so many people weren't being murdered in Libya, I probably would have burst out laughing.
There was our own crazed tin pot dictator Stephen Harper lecturing the deranged Muammar Gaddafi on human rights.
Trying to sound tough. While not even calling on Gaddafi to step down. Or calling for a no-fly zone. Which only made Harper look like a chihuahua. Or an absolute IDIOT.
Gawd. Is there nothing these Con hogs won't do to try to win a majority? Or soil what's left of our democracy?
Today they were squealing all over the country plugging their Porky Action Plan.
The Harper government is wringing every last drop of political gain out of the largely exhausted stimulus package, staging an unprecedented number of events across the country while spending millions on ads in the run-up to a possible election.
Blatantly buying votes.
Apart from a few exceptions, virtually all of the $60-billion stimulus package money has been spent. Even so, the government is currently spending $6.5-million to promote the action plan through to March 27, which is about when a federal election campaign will start if the government is defeated next month over the budget.
Denis Lebel, Minister of State for Canada Economic Development, will announce funding to Saint-Anthony's Hermitage in Lac-Bouchette...which has "enabled the sanctuary to renovate the site's buildings, build two cottages and set up a wooden observation tower equipped with interpretive panels depicting the life of Saint Anthony."
An important infrastructure event with the Honourable Diane Ablonczy, MP, Minister of State of Foreign Affairs.DETAILS: Given the dearth of alternate scenarios, this appears to be a ministerial tour of the CEA!P-renovated locker rooms at the Crowfoot YMCA. Seriously.
Even as some excellent work by the Canadian Press reveals the Porky Action Plan website to be nothing but a SCAM. Designed and controlled down to the last detail by Stephen Harper's sinister operatives in the PMO.
A flashy taxpayer-funded website was conceived as the "key component" in marketing the Conservative government's Economic Action Plan, a secret memo prepared for Stephen Harper reveals.
Documents reveal it is part of a massive, centrally co-ordinated campaign — critics call it partisan propaganda — orchestrated out of the Prime Minister's Office at taxpayer expense.
For the greater glory of the Briber-in-Chief...
So he can win a majority, and then claim the government has no money, so he HAS to strangle medicare.
Oh boy. I could go on about how this stimulus program should have been used to invest in new green industries to give the unemployed youth of Canada a future. Instead of trying to BUY an election.
But I'm too tired tonight.
So all I can say is what I always say. Because you can't say it enough times eh?
This country is in terrible danger. This isn't a government, it's a MOB.
Starting Monday, the Canadian family restaurant fires up a constant televised loop of 12 roasters turning on a spit to promote the chain.
The Rotisserie Channel will feature two rows of chickens roasting in an open-flame oven.
OMG. What a fowl move. They get on the air while the Fox News North gang is still counting its pencils, and steal half their audience before they even have a chance to FAIL.
Because Cons aren't too bright eh?
And are easily hypnotized by the sight of chickens going round and round.
Oh well. I'm sure Kory Teneycke will find some cheap way to lure them back...
I mean he lured himself back eh?
And I suppose when things get DESPERATE.
As they will. Very very quickly.
They can always try Turkey Tuesdays...
Mmmmm...TASTY. And obviously ALL you can eat.
But will it be enough to stop their dumb redneck viewers from flocking to the Chicken Channel?
Golly. I don't know.
You don't think Ezra Levant could do the weather dressed in a fish suit do you ?
Oh he CAN?
Oh well. That changes EVERYTHING.
A Chicken Channel AND a Con Fish Channel. Canada's back !!!!!!
Gawd. If the rest of the world finds out about this, our BATTERED image will never recover.
We interrupt our regular programming to take you to the PMO, where Great Political Genius Bumbling Leader is explaining his plan to fool Canadians into giving him a majority.
And the Con stooges are trying to play their victory song Mein Harper Right or NOT. But it's coming out sounding like this.
And who can blame them eh? One week ago they were cruising towards a majority.
The federal Conservatives' lead over the rival Liberals stands at five points, according to a new survey by EKOS, putting the parties back on a familiar footing after recent surveys showed a much wider gap.
One moment they were soaring like buzzards...
The next moment they were plunging like turkeys.
WHEEEEEEEEH. Gobble. Gobble. Fasten your seatbelts. Put on your oxygen masks !!! Ask Stockwell Day to pray for us !!!!
Although the survey doesn't have direct evidence on this point, it is possible that this recoil effect, which is a recurring pattern of the past five years, was magnified by the Bev Oda affair. In a familiar pattern of voter recoil and government missteps, the tantalizing majority of a fortnight ago has evaporated into the narrow rut advantage of the last year. Zap! You've been Odasized!
But then why should we be surprised eh? As I explained last night, when even many of your own supporters don't trust you with a majority.
You can only fly so high, before your wings fall off.
Or you're reduced to flapping around.
Like a political genius...
Or a batty IDIOT.
Golly. Now that we know how scared Canadians are of Harper, I see a great election campaign horror movie.The Vampire Who Would Kill Medicare. Or the Monster Who Would KILL for a Majority.
Only about 26 per cent of Canadians say they would be comfortable with the Conservatives winning a majority after the next election, according to a new poll conducted for The Globe and Mail and CTV by Nanos Research.
Even in the Prairies, home turf for the Conservative Party, there are as many people uncomfortable as there are comfortable with the idea.
Golly. What does it say about a leader when even many of his supporters don't trust him with a majority?
I wonder why?
OMG. Is that scary or what? A Prime Minister too deeply disturbed to be allowed absolute power.
Because who knows what he might do to Canada eh?
And isn't this ironic?
In undermining Mr. Ignatieff, the Conservatives failed to build themselves up, to make Canadians feel sufficiently comfortable with Mr. Harper to trust him with a majority government.
It’s the price the Conservatives are paying, says Mr. Nanos, “for tearing down and tearing apart their opponents.”
The other day I told you the story of 10-year-old Maria Aragon from Toronto, who became an YouTube star after singing Lady Gaga's new song Born this Way.
It's so good, in fact, that it made Gaga tear up with emotion. She tweeted: "Can't stop crying watching this. This is why I make music. She is the future."
And how I also thought her video was fabulous.
And deserves the more than eleven MILLION views it has received so far.
Until I learned she had left out these lines:
No matter gay, straight or bi
lesbian, transgendered life
I'm on the right track, baby
I was born to survive
Then I was disappointed. And sad.
I mean that could only happen to gay people eh? Being left out of the so-called gay anthem. And too bad more than eleven million people didn't get to hear that message. Because so many need to hear it.
But today Maria performed the song on the Ellen Show.
This time with ALL the lyrics...
And now I forgive her.
Children only do what adults tell them. She IS fabulous. So are we.
Or at least that's what his Christianist fans, in Jamaica believe.
When they are not blaming gays for what happened to their bigot idol.
Buju is being villified because he dare to speak out and sing against homosexuality which angered the powerful lesbian and 'gay' lobby which resides in north american and western european countries.
Homosexual groups ask for tolerance for their objectionable and deviant behaviour,yet they don't show such tolerance to persons who are against the homosexual lifestyle and speak out against it.
As if the DEA has a soft spot for gay people. And the Buju bigot wasn't caught on video licking coke off a knife.
Right. You know if it was up to me, I would have given him five more years for impersonating a Rastaman. Because I LOVE reggae music.
Now how did that murder song go ?
Yup. The way I see it justice finally caught up with a CRIMINAL.
It was almost more than I could bear. There was Stephen Harper in beautiful British Columbia. Standing in front of a Porky Action Plan backdrop, with a touch of pink now added to soften up his image and appeal to female voters.
Buying votes like a two-bit ward heeler.
While some reporter asked if he'd heard about that awful hit-and-run, and whether he was planning to bring in stiffer penalties for the guilty.
Nobody asked about the Bev Oda scandal. Or why he was campaigning when he says he doesn't want an election.
And of course he refused to answer any questions about this poll.
The federal Conservative party’s recent attack campaign appears to have worked, as a new poll suggests Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s support is up across the country.
The latest Nanos poll — conducted between Feb. 11 and Feb. 14 — shows Harper’s Wake Up ad campaign that attacked Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff and his party has resulted in a 13-point Canada-wide advantage for the Tories over the Liberals, according to poll author Nik Nanos.
Because then he'd have to pretend he doesn't care about polls. When in fact the smell of a majority has him drooling so much he has to carry a roll of toilet paper in each pocket.
Or remind people that attack ads work. Because some progressives just might start wondering why they are lying there taking it, instead of fighting back.
I can't do that eh? Even when I was a skinny teenager, and before I took martial arts, I understood that it was better to lose a fight, than roll up like a hedgehog, and let the bully kick you like a ball.
Because that way you could never hurt him, or EVER expect to win.
Stephen Harper is the worst bully in Canadian history, and unless him and his foul Cons are defeated they will DESTROY this country. It's that simple.
As is the choice facing us. We can choose to surrender.
Oh.My.Mafia. I hear the Con mob in the PMO, now known as the Oda Gang, are desperate.
The new boss is now claiming she couldn't have whacked KAIROS, because she has an alibi. She was out of town. So even though she owes her new position to the fact she knows too much. She doesn't know ANYTHING eh?
According to new information, senior CIDA staff sent a memo to Oda, recommending the government provide funding for KAIROS. However, Oda did not agree with the decision. But because she was not in Ottawa that day, it was left to her aides to handle the paperwork.
“They, with the minister’s authority, applied her automated signature, which is used when required because a Minister is unable to personally sign a document, and indicated her decision on the memo by clearly indicating that she did NOT approve the funding application,” government officials said in their memo.
While the Prime Minister is said to be in a safe house, in case he has to leave the country in a hurry.
And trying to keep the lid on this sordid scandal, the only way he knows how.
But then who can blame him eh?
Didn't that former PMO operative spill the beans the other day?
Didn't he testify that If Oda didn't approve of the application all she had to do was tell the aide da machine NOT to sign it. I thought so.
And surely those Cons aren't suggesting that KAIROS was just another dossier on a busy minister's desk.
In a briefing note distributed to Conservative MPs over the weekend, they said, “Hundreds of these internal memos cross ministers’ desks every day.”
When Jason Kenney made it clear KAIROS had been singled out for execution mutilation by the sinister hit men in the PMO, for being disloyal to the state of Israel.
Immigration Minister Jason Kenney has accused Christian aid group KAIROS of being anti-Semitic and disclosed that's why the group suddenly lost its federal funding.
He was lying of course. But what's new eh? The Cons lie all the time about EVERYTHING. And they are still lying now.
But fine. Oda recently complained that she was being treated like a character in CSI. So let's make her fantasy nightmare come true.
Let's call in the aide, bring in a handwriting expert, and a lie detector. And see who is telling the truth.
But wait. Didn't the Cons recently decree that aides can't be questioned by parliamentary committees? Only ministers can. How bloody convenient eh?
And what a modus operandi. Whack or mutilate decent Canadian groups. Intimidate others.
Rule by fear like the mob. Doctor documents, lie about it over and over again.
And when everything fails, blame aides because they can't talk.
Or blame da machine...
Because it can't SQUEAL.
And neither can Oda. Or she'll be flushed. Or going for a ride in a wheelbarrow.
Oh boy. What have we become? The arrogance of power must make them think we're FOOLS.
When Lady Gaga's latest single Born this Way was released it was billed as a new gay anthem.
And I was quite excited eh?
Because "Over the Rainbow," By Saint Judy Garland of the Homosexuals, is getting a bit dated. And Gloria Gaynor's "I Will Survive" has always made me feel like killing myself.
But sadly it isn't our new anthem. Lady Gaga said she wrote it in ten minutes. And it shows.
That noise you hear? It isn't nearby construction or birds cawwing. Its not the rumbling of a train or even the low roar of the ocean. It's not an American Eagle-clad youth screaming "Whoo!" in your ear at a megadisco.
That noise is one million gay men simultaneously vomiting up the kool-aid of arbitrarily prescribed cultural icons. And I don't know why it took so long.
I do believe in culture as politics. But Lady Gaga is not culture.
But what does that gay snoot think it is? Opera? Why shouldn't gay people love an artist who supports their causes and includes them in her songs?
It's title and its spirit, are drawn from the first openly gay song ever recorded.
"I'm walking through life in nature's disguise/ You laugh at me and you criticise/ Just because I'm happy, I'm carefree and I'm gay/ Yes I'm gay/ Tain't a fault tis a fact/ I was born this way."
So why is this happening? Oh probably because there are a lot of young people out there who are tired of being bullied, called too fat or too skinny, or too shy or too gentle, or too black, or too ugly, or too gay, or whatever.
And are enjoying the chance to shout out : I WAS BORN THIS WAY !!!!!!
And that's good enough for me.
Besides, I play it when I walk the dog, and he LOVES dancing down the street with me.
Look, I wish our gay anthem was more like "Street Fighting Man" or "Rock the Casbah" by the Clash, or "Rebellion" by Arcade Fire.
But while I wait for it, snoots please get a life...or stick to opera eh?
As long as you remember that he is a werewolf, that he can't help himself, that he lies all the time. And that no matter how much you scratch his hairy back, if he smells a majority before the budget comes down, he'll go for it like a rabid...um...werewolf.
Because it seems to me that Jack has forgotten that we're living in a time of ideological WAR. Stephen Harper's overriding objective is to destroy government, by starving it with tax cuts, and wasting billions on jet planes and prisons.
So he can use a large deficit to slash social services, kill all kinds of Canadian institutions, strangle medicare, and turn this country into a JUNGLE.
By allowing Harper to go ahead with is his corporate tax cuts, Layton gives this incredibly destructive prime minister the one thing he really wants and allows Harper to maintain undiminished his ideological assault on the country and its political culture.
The most important thing Layton could have done was set Harper back on his heels in his blitzkrieg against the activist role of government. Instead he has acquiesced to it and reinforced it – a huge gift to Harper.
And in the process probably boned himself:
Layton, by far the most trusted politician on the federal scene, will now be seen by many as going hat in hand to a man who not only condones lying but effectively endorses it. He looks desperate.
And left Stephen Harper happily howling at the moon:
No one who pays even scant attention to federal politics will believe for a minute that Harper was “respectful” of Jack Layton. This man is a sociopath and is contemptuous of almost every other human on the planet. He was laughing because he knew he held the winning hand.
Because he's a werewolf eh? And he can't help himself.
Oh boy. I like Jack Layton. And I realize that we're all living in desperate times.
But those who don't recognize that we're fighting an ideological war for the future of Canada are condemned to lose it.
So all I can suggest is that the next time Jack visits Great Werewolf Leader he might get a better deal if he avoids meeting him when there's a full moon. As he did yesterday.
And uses Bev Oda's limo wheelbarrow.
To bring him a monster-sized serving of beef chow mein...
